


How I'm Imagining You

by orphan_account



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Crowley does a little Tempting of his own, Crowley is a wily demon and Aziraphale's not all that innocent either, Fluff, M/M, Praise Kink, Roleplay, Seduction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-07-08 13:49:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19870663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Crowley gets up, walking slowly over to the bar. An onlooker might be struck by the stalking and languid ease with which he walks, like a lioness to her prey. His hips, so smooth and slow. And he tilts his head back, lips parted. Surveys the room and the man with covered eyes. But there is no one looking at him. Every other patron doesn’t need to look at the bar at this moment, look at the man and the prey. So, they don’t.-(Crowley has fun with a little temptation of his own)





	How I'm Imagining You

**Author's Note:**

> this was inspired by talk by Hozier so if you want to get the vibe listen to that song!

There’s a reason Crowley chose this bar for his work. It was cheap and dirty and dark, and just the right sort of people visited it. See, Crowley’s _thing_ was the overall effect. Other demons might be content to tempt a priest or a politician, but Crowley liked the big picture. If you ruin everyone’s day just a little bit, the knock-on effect brought whole cities closer to Hell.

But sometimes it just wasn’t enough.

Sometimes he needed to see it up close. To feel a person’s goodness slip a little further away, and to know that it was him doing it. It was selfish, but that was the sort of thing that Hell endorsed. The luxurious feeling of being the one to bring someone down to his level? It was what made the temptations worth the effort.

Crowley smells him before he sees him. The smell of goodness, of warmth and holiness, is distinct and clear even over the smell of sweat and booze. He lets the aura of righteousness coat his senses, revelling in the buzz it brings.

(It used to be too much for him, bordering on painful. But now it forms a different kind of sensation. Something unique to them. He’s proud of it. Proud of how they’ve taken something so hard and softened it. Just for them.)

He thinks, _this one has so far to fall. Let’s bring him down a notch._

The holy man is sitting at the bar, cheerfully chatting to the bartender. Of what, Crowley couldn’t tell. He’s drinking wine, red, and rolling the glass around to indulge in the rich taste. Utterly unaware of the demon at his back, at the back of the room. Crowley chose this seat specifically so that he’s unseen beneath the neon lights.

The glint of light off his glasses is not that of a friend’s. This is a demon, the kind to be warned and whispered about. Staring and watching and planning his next move.

Crowley watches him lean forward to hear the bartender over the noise of the other patrons and places his hand gently on his arm. The bartender laughs, and he smiles innocently up at him. Laughs. Takes a sip from his wine.

This is the first part of the game.

Crowley gets up, walking slowly over to the bar. An onlooker might be struck by the stalking and languid ease with which he walks, like a lioness to her prey. His hips, so smooth and slow. And he tilts his head back, lips parted. Surveys the room and the man with covered eyes. But there is no one looking at him. Every other patron doesn’t need to look at the bar at this moment, look at the man and the prey. So, they don’t.

The bartender, now leaning against the bar so friendly, tilts his head back to laugh at something the man had remarked. Crowley watches the line of the bartender’s throat as he laughs, and the edge of his jaw as he looks back down. The man’s hand is still on the bartender’s arm. The bartender’s eyes lose their friendly warmth as Crowley sits on the stool one over.

“Can I help you?” he asks. _Let me get back to talking to this man,_ he doesn’t say. _Let me pursue him._

“Whiskey. On the rocks,” Crowley says, and the man smiles into his wine. The bartender’s eyes skirt back to him, but he stands back up and fixes Crowley his drink.

_Too late. Mine._

Now begins the second part of the game.

“Awfully tough drink,” the man says, “trying to make a point?” His voice is soft, but Crowley can feel the interest prickle at his fingertips. A sixth sense, to help him know when his temptations are working.

“And what kind of point would that be?” Crowley replies. He nods at the bartender with a deeply unsettling grin. The bartender smiles tightly back and goes to wipe down the glasses at the other end of the bar.

“That you’re a mystery man. Wearing sunglasses indoors, drinking hard, that sort of thing,” the man says. “I admire your dedication to your look.” He nods at Crowley’s all-black ensemble; one he’d carefully picked out for the raking eyes of whoever he found to tempt. He is not disappointed with the result they bring.

“And I, you.” The man is wearing a soft cream coat and lovely pressed pants. There is something clean about them, untouched and pure and sweet.

“This bar, this is an awfully dirty place for someone as sweet as you,” Crowley says, and the smell of holiness spikes on his tongue.

“Well, one must venture outside of one’s habitat every once in a while,” the man says.

“Anthony,” Crowley says, offering his hand with a flash of teeth.

“Azrael,” the man says, and takes his hand.

Crowley feels their essences connect like a livewire, and it almost makes him draw his hand back. But he holds tight for a second. And in that second, he pours a Thought into the man’s head. And he sees that Thought spread through his body, filling his head and heart and lungs with the thick tar of it. And then he lets go.

In the Thought, one of Crowley’s own design, the man is standing above a demon awash with pleasure. He brings his hand down to cup his cheek, and the demon gasps out a single word.

“Please…”

Step three.

The man’s eyes linger on his. For a moment Crowley feels unhinged, like this strange man’s gaze can see through his dark frames and into everything twisted about him. But then the eyes dip down to his mouth, and Crowley knows it goes from here. Hell keeps him on Earth for a reason. He’s good at his job, at making everyone he meets a little less shiny and new. And the veneer this strange gentleman has is wearing thinner. Crowley says nothing and sips his drink.

He isn’t looking but he can feel the holiness in the man’s eyes, and how those eyes stare at his skin. His jaw, the careful stubble, his hair, his nose, his glasses. His mouth as he sips. The bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows.

He sets the glass down unkindly on the greasy bar and stands up. The man, so strange in this dirty place, follows the movement with his eyes and takes the final gulp of his wine. Crowley takes off his jacket. His shirt is a button-up with a sheer swirly cut-out design. It hangs just so on his body, showing just enough with the promise of more. He tilts his head, cracking his neck, and angles his body to face the man. He knows what the man sees, the long clean lines of his body highlighted by the harsh lights behind the bar. They cast eerie shadows onto Crowley’s face and the man swears that for just a second, he sees the outline of horns on his head.

Crowley says nothing. He lets time sit on its haunches, savouring the eyes on him. Then, he grins down at the man and turns to walk out the door. He manages a single step before he hears the scrape of the barstool and feels the man’s presence behind him.

This is where the game ends. Crowley has what he wants. The man might think he’s won the prize, but Crowley knows better.

Crowley pushes open the door, shivering in the cold wind. The man closes the gap between them, one hand on his hip. Gripping. They walk together down the road. There are no cars this late at night, just the wind and the streetlights. Crowley looks down at their shadows cast from the gloomy streetlights and sees the shadows of wings.

Their walk is short, but Crowley can feel each and every second. They reach a corner, and the man squeezes his hip.

“Here,” he says, and Crowley turns around. Looks down at the strange man with the beautiful coat and the wings and the holiness and leans down.

And he can’t help but smile into the kiss as Aziraphale opens the door. They tumble inside, and Crowley jerks him further into the shop before he can turn the light on, dropping his jacket on the doormat. He yelps as he accidentally stumbles and hits his ankle on the corner of the coffee table, but Aziraphale has him by the hand and is whisking him up the stairs.

He almost falls over Aziraphale, who stops halfway up the stairwell. He laughs and cups Crowley’s face in his hands. Out at the bar, this is Crowley’s game, the Temptation he does so well. But here, in the bookshop, the game is theirs.

There’s a buzzing under his skin where Aziraphale is holding his face so tenderly. Crowley, beautiful snake eyes, can’t see his face properly in the dark with the glasses on. But he can guess the love in Aziraphale’s eyes and the grin on his face.

Crowley’s got a few inches of height over Aziraphale. He’s been wearing heeled boots too, so in the bar and for the walk home Aziraphale only reached his chin. But with Aziraphale standing on the stair above him, Crowley has to tilt his head up to reach him. It’s new, but the gentle coil of heat through his body tells him that he likes it.

Aziraphale runs his thumbs over Crowley’s eyebrows. Over his cheekbones. Dips one down over his mouth. Crowley’s tongue darts out to wet the pad, and he can taste the electricity in the air. Aziraphale chuckles and leans down the cover his mouth soundly with his own.

They make their way up the rest of the stairs and to the door with minimal injuries, only losing a pair of loafers and a very cream jacket and waistcoat, which are thrown carelessly onto the floor. Aziraphale pushes Crowley up against the doorframe as they cross the threshold, and it makes Crowley’s knees weak. He’s still towering over Aziraphale, but he feels so powerless. Aziraphale starts unbuttoning his shirt and slips his hand inside.

“How does it feel, being the one pushed around? Not so tough are you now, demon?” Aziraphale says, breathless in between kisses. There’s a fire in his voice that seeps through, and Crowley’s always been coldblooded, drawn to the heat. Something in his voice echoes around their ribcages with righteousness. It’s a gift, to overtake someone in awe through the power of voice alone, but Aziraphale uses it ruthlessly. Crowley sags against him, stuttering out a gasp.

“Be grateful that no one is here to see you. The powers of darkness, overcome by a simple kiss.” His eyes rake over Crowley’s face. “By the power of love.” And he leans back in, and Crowley leans forward to meet him. His mind feels hazy, partly from the headiness of it all, partly from the love he can feel pouring out of Aziraphale.

 _Flashes of love, indeed_.

Aziraphale steps back and pulls Crowley towards the bed. Crowley clutches at his collar, never more than a breath away from his mouth. He sways on his legs and lands abruptly on the soft counterpane.

Aziraphale smiles, so sweet and kind, and gently takes Crowley’s glasses off. He takes his time folding them up and placing them delicately on the bedside table, before turning back and running his hand through Crowley’s hair. It’s getting a little longer, curling at the edges along his neck and ears. He takes a moment to look at Crowley, drinks in the sight of him. His shirt, all messed up and so different from the cut lines of before. His legs, parted to let Aziraphale in. His red mouth.

“Do another,” Aziraphale says, and Crowley frowns.

“Another what?”

“Another, you know…” Aziraphale blushes. “Another Thought.”

“Ahh...” Crowley says, and tries to put his brain back together to think something up.

“How about this?” he says and blinks the Thought lazily into Aziraphale’s head. In it, Crowley is gasping up at Aziraphale, hair damp against the soft white sheets as they move through the Earth’s orbit as one.

“Or perhaps this.” Another Thought, this time with Aziraphale kneeling beside the bed. Not in prayer, but in a ritual of their own.

And a final one, which Crowley gifts to Aziraphale with a kiss. Two ethereal creatures, their very essences joined as one. Soft and unreal. Far beyond the physical plane, but so much better for it.

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale murmurs, “you really are so wonderful.” The word sparks in his gut, and he clenches his eyes shut. But Aziraphale continues, leaning over him and guiding his head onto the sheets with his hand.

“So lovely. Even when you’re Tempting me you are still so kind.”

“Don’t… say that again,” Crowley groans. Aziraphale lowers his body to press against Crowley’s and undoes the rest of the buttons on his shirt.

“Letting me choose to go with you. Any other demon wouldn’t have been so gentle.” Crowley hisses as Aziraphale’s hand smooths down his chest, followed by his mouth. “You’re so good to me, Crowley.” He flicks open the button on his tight trousers.

“I’m a demon.”

“All the demons in the world, and She gifts me with the nicest,” he whispers, and Crowley’s eyes flutter shut.

-

The light seeps into the bedroom with a soft yellow. Crowley is curled up against Aziraphale, hair tickling his nose. Crowley scrunches it up and blinks back into consciousness. He smiles against the soft skin of Aziraphale’s shoulder, and his fingers smooth over the counterpane as a reflex.

It’s a dark navy blue, with gold embroidered designs spread on top. The feeling of the rough thread reminds him of when they’d picked it out together.

_“What about this one? Seems alright enough to me.”_

_“Oh, but it’s awfully dark and dreary. Why do you keep choosing-“_

_“D’you see the gold?”_

_“Oh, I… I do. Oh, that’s lovely. Yes, let’s get this one.”_

Crowley runs his fingers over the curves of the design. The old one had been beige, which had gone perfectly with the rest of the upstairs living area. Not that Aziraphale had ever used it much. But ever since Crowley had darkened the doorstep for good, the little things that made the space His had blurred into Theirs. The plant in the corner, the dark wooden dresser. The counterpane, with the gold stitching. Little symbols that made up their new world.

Crowley knows he’s got a dopey love-sick expression on, but there’s no one to see it so he can’t help but forget to care. What they have, the unlikely pair of an angel and a demon isn’t the kind of love Hell would be proud of. This isn’t a Seven Deadly Sins kind of love, the kind that Crowley had revelled in creating. This love was all their own, a creation of Heaven and Hell that should never have existed, but that did anyway. It meant something. And, perhaps, it existed only because they expected it to.


End file.
